Spiritual mothering

God created every life to be fruitful and multiply, but this God-given dream represents more than physical offspring. I believe our dreams to have babies represent a desire to have fruitful lives, to invest ourselves in something that matters and makes a difference.

In the Old Testament, God promised great numbers of physical descendants. In the New Testament, His emphasis is clearly on spiritual offspring. God calls us to be fruitful and to multiply until He calls us home. Potential for spiritual offspring is virtually limitless. God desires to empower you to bear spiritual offspring. God created you to bear much fruit. When I was a little girl, I wanted to be a mommy more than anything in the world. Now my children are almost grown. Recently my older daughter and I were enjoying a time of rich fellowship together when she paused and asked, “Mom, when Melissa and I grow up and perhaps even move far away from you and Daddy, will you be OK?”

A lump welled in my throat, but I still answered confidently: “Yes, darling. Most people just need to feel useful. As long as I have Jesus, I will always feel useful — even if I occasionally feel lonely.”

I have tried my hardest to keep my children from growing up, but all my efforts have failed. Sometimes I think: “What will I ever do? I was born to be a mommy!” Then I remember God has called me primarily to women’s ministry, and I will always have the opportunity to “mother” a few spiritual offspring as long as I am willing to invest myself.

In fact, one of my spiritual daughters has a particularly dry and delightful wit. She is a gifted Bible teacher at only 27 years of age and hardly ever misses an opportunity to affectionately rib me about my age. I introduced her once as a spiritual daughter, and later she said, “Since you led the person to the Lord, who in turn, led me to the Lord, wouldn’t that really make you my spiritual grand-mother?” After that I called her a smart aleck, we had a great laugh, and every card or gift that I have sent to her since that remark have all been signed, “Love, Granny.”

If God chose for you to have physical children, prepare yourself! They will grow up! Then it is time to enlarge your tent and invest in spiritual children! If God chooses for you never to have physical children, He is calling you to a bigger family! God purposely placed the dream of fruitful lives in our hearts. Oh, how I love the paradoxical ways our glorious heavenly Father works. Only He can bring gain from loss. Only He can make us more fruitful in our barrenness!

One final thought. Undoubtedly one of the reasons I wanted children was to bear offspring who were the image of my husband. I wanted little Keiths and Keithettes! I did not want them to look like me. I have always thought Keith was far more beautiful than I. You see, the same is true of our spiritual offspring. Once we fall in love with Christ, we are so taken with His beauty, we want children to look just like Him. That is spiritual parenting in a nutshell; raising spiritual sons and daughters to look just like their Father in Heaven. What could be more important?

Footnotes

This article was adapted from Breaking Free © 2000 (Broadman and Holman). Used by permission.